AN: My very first Supernatural fanfiction, let me know if you like it! It's written in the point of view of Castiel when he was Emmanuel.
Beta'd by: Skylark22155
Written for: Firefly81
Enjoy! :D
My eyes flutter open and immediately I close them again, for the sun is too bright for my uncovered pupils. I sit up. Not having any idea why I've been resting in the middle of a thick, green forest doesn't suit my fast growing paranoia. I begin walking in the direction I must have come from. With no compass on hand, it looks like it's going to be a hard trek trying to find civilization.
Why did I fall asleep in the forest? Did anyone come with me? How did I get here? These questions plague my mind over and over again, pinging off my skull and reverberating. It's been an hour, and all I've found is a small creek which I bent over with cupped hands and drank deeply from. My survival skills buried deep in my memory trigger a feeling in me that I should pay attention to the moss on the rocks, and I change my course north. Why is it that I can remember things like survival but not anything about my family? Where am I even headed to?
Another hour passes, before I find anything remotely like a human habitat, which causes me to approach the tattered tent with caution. It's torn into shreds, inside shows things like fishing tackle and camping gear strewn across the floor. This leads me to believe that a hungry bear made an appearance, and apparently didn't eat just leftover smoked hotdogs. It must have been in the mood for more ... fresh meat. I try very hard to not touch the dried blood clinging to the nylon tent, instead I back away in a panic.
I breathe deeply, trying to pretend like I hadn't seen the tragic scene. It's alright, things like that happen all the time. Besides, this means I must be getting closer to human population.
Making the smart decision to sleep for the night. I find a hollowed out standing tree to cuddle in.
In the morning, the blazing hot sun beams down onto my neck, and I wake up with a little bit of sunburn pain. Beginning my trek again, I wish to find another creek nearby. Instead, I hear a noise. It rustles the bushes to my left, and I jump away. I really wish I was wearing something more protective than a polo shirt and jeans.
The bushes rustle again, and I get ready to climb a tree faster than a cat if a bear peers through. I crouch with my calves ready to leap, my breathing kicks up and my heart begins to race. The bushes come apart, and to my amazement, it's not a bear, but a person.
"Hello? Who might you be?" The stranger asked with a concerned voice.
"I- who are you?"
"My name is Daphne. I- I don't mean to be so frank, but are you lost?"
I sigh, "Yes, I am."
Inside Daphne's house my head pounds with a headache, and I still don't remember anything. I wonder if this should be something to be alarmed about. Her house is lovely and cozy, with beautiful decor. She asks me if I want anything to eat or drink which I gladly accept. Daphne is a very kind person for saving me out of that Godforsaken forest. It turns out I was only about three hundred meters away from the city.
"So, I didn't catch you name before?" Daphne sits at the kitchen table with me.
Around a bite of ramen noodles, I say, "I don't know-" Pause. "- I seriously don't know."
My eyes drop down and my eyebrows fall, I don't look up from my noodles. I sniff my nose.
"Are you crying?"
"No, it's just the steam."
Daphne stares at me long and hard. It's a little unsettling but I can only focus on filling my stomach up. I must have been gone for more than a few days without food. It does alarm me, but I am trying to keep my thoughts from the wrong zone, for some reason panicking sounds like a stupid thing I wouldn't do.
"If you don't know your name, we're going to have to give you one. So, what do you like?"
I think for a moment. "I don't know. What do you think?"
Daphne chuckles and brings her laptop to the table, she types in a website called bouncingbabynames. I look through her list of name ideas and my eyes fall upon one in particular, it seems to tickle at the edges of my mind. Emmanuel.
"I like this one."
"Okay, from now on I christen thee, Emmanuel." She pretends to cup and uncup her hands over my head, baptizing me. I laugh out loud for some reason. Nothing makes sense to me anymore.
2 Months Later
"Get out of the house now! Why are you here?" I shout from across the room. Blocking the Demon from my newly, beloved wife Daphne. Without her I would be at a loss for the world.
The Demon laughs like a lunatic and brings his hand up in a 'stop' position. He appears to be concentrating, but is shocked to find out his powers don't work on me. My healing powers must be preventing him from harming me, yeah, that's it.
"Why are you here?" I ask again. Trying to wheedle any information from about who must have sent him.
The demon's black beetle eyes focus on me, and I gulp. "I was sent by your worst nightmare! I have heard of a healer living here, and I am told to come fetch you for my master."
I think about a course of actions that wouldn't anger the monster, but before I can open my mouth, the door burst open. Two people burst in, but the boy lunges in and kills the bad guy with a knife. I step forward to give him my thanks.
"Thank you, I'm Emmanuel." Who is this guy who can hunt monsters?
He seems hesitant to shake my hand, its like he doesn't want to look at me. I guess being picky about the mood and expression of someone who hunts monsters, might be too selfish. Although, I'm not sure about the etiquette of looking like he wants either of us dead.
"I'm Dean." Dean…
"Well thank you again for helping me, this is my wife, Daphne." I hold her hand and pull her forward.
Dean's friend speaks up for herself. "I'm Meg."
Dean asks me if I can help him heal his brother, and I tell him that all ailments, even spiritual ones are under my power. In a moments notice I'm shoved into a car by Dean's friend.
"Meg and I are going to take you to him," Dean says while sliding into the driver's seat.
Meg gives Emmanuel a cheeky grin. "You don't remember a thing, do you Cas?"
Inside of my body I feel something weird resonate when she addresses me as that, but mostly I feel confused. Dean seems very angry, whipping his head in her direction and staring at her like his eyes can explode things.
"Do we know each other?" I ask with uncertainty. I had felt it back at the house with Daphne that I knew Dean, but again, my mind wants to run and hide from the truth. Somehow, I don't think Dean will like me when I find out who he is.
"No, we don't. My friend's name is Cas, Meg here, she just made a simple mistake. You kinda look like him."
Meg smirks in Dean's general direction. "You're an angel."
My head begins to hurt, as if it literally wants to split open. Violent flashes of memory flicker with speed too fast to hold onto. I fall to the car floor clutching my head. Every piece of information that I've been clueless of the past few month has come back to me. Everything clears and the pain recedes. I am an angel of the Lord, Castiel.
I rise back into my seat with a serious expression. "Hello, Dean."
In a few short moments, Dean turns the headlights off and drives slowly to a stop. We're right outside Sam's Asylum, and there are Leviathan standing guard outside. All due respect to my friends, but right now is not the time that I feel like storming the castle and smiting everyone to pieces. The guilt is overwhelming and because I'm an Angel, I can't handle these human emotions. It's foreign and not everything I imagined it to be, which is why I understand Dean a little more now, about why he constantly feels like dying. It my fault that Sam is the way he is though, so I must fix what I left behind.
Dean stares at me waiting for my new line of action, and I think he can see the thoughts in my mind. His expression darkens and his frown becomes a crooked smile, just as I was thinking about leaving no survivors.
"Let me at em'," I say with determination.
"That's ma' boy."
I walk calmly up to the leviathan guards standing in front of the doors, and with a touch of my palm to their heads, they're knees weaken and they fall in a pile at my feet, dead.
Behind the guilt, I feel like I owe everything to the Winchesters, Dean especially who never left me in the dust. Yes, he's thinking I'm an assbutt right now, but still came to rescue me. I'm going to go in there and rebuild the wall in Sam's mind. I want them to forgive me.
Inside the building, I search high and low for Sam. Down another empty hall I hear strange noises, so I run that way and inside an orderly is reaching for a machine. Sam writhes under the pain of the strange, whirring machine, so I smite the orderly and unplug it. Sam breathes heavily shaking all over. He looks terrible, without sleep and proper food, the man looks like a boy, a very small, frightened boy. The guilt inside me cringes in pain, I can't stand it.
"Sam, I am so sorry." What more can I say?
He just stares at me, then at the door behind me. Dean stands there with an expectant expression, willing himself to stay calm. "Just do the damn thing," He says to me.
I reach my hand to Sam's head and concentrate all my energy into finding the wall in his mind, but to no avail. It's done for, crumbled into irreparable pieces. I didn't think that would happen, in order for the wall to break, Sam must be in very deep with Lucifer. So real to him that you might think you could touch him, so Sam must have been through Hell trying to ignore Lucifer calling to him.
"I am so sorry, Sam." I turn to Dean. "I can't."
"What do you mean you can't?" Dean's eyebrows pull together and he clenches his jaw.
"The wall is crumbled to the ground, but let me try one more thing."
I hope with my very last shred of hope, that if there is a God out there who wants Sam Winchester alive and sane, that he will give me a way to heal him. I close my eyes and pray, and then a single tear slips from one of my eyes, which promptly dissipates. They say that when an Angel cries, they get one redemption card, anything they want can come true if they truly had a fall from grace. If an Angel truly wants to repent from their mistake, they will feel the pain of humans and empathize for them.
I put my hand back on a confused looking Sam, and concentrate hard while Dean watches over with a serious expression. I focus on something deep within Sam's soul, and know what I must do to get rid of Lucifer, for Sam. I concentrate on sucking everything up inside of my own mind. I can feel the solid edges of my skull become fragile, and the partition in my angel mind, becomes ripped. Once that's done, transferring Hell inside of my body, I immediately fall into a fatigue. I lurch forward a little bit. While straightening myself, I stare up at Dean.
"I just want to look at the honey bees."